Ep. 519 Debate/Discussion: Should Libertarians Support a Basic Income Guarantee?
The Tom Woods Show
Tom Woods
4.8 • 3.4K Ratings
🗓️ 26 October 2015
⏱️ 66 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Some voices in the libertarian world have argued that a basic income guarantee for everyone would be better than the current welfare state from a pragmatic point of view. Matt Zwolinski adds that it is morally required, given the dubious origins of so many existing property titles. Result: an engaging exchange of ideas I know you'll enjoy. But be sure to listen all the way to the end, since that's where the best parts can be found.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | The Tom Woods Show, episode 519. |
| 0:03.3 | Prepare to set fire to the index card of allowable opinion. |
| 0:08.1 | Your daily dose of liberty education starts here, the Tom Woods Show. |
| 0:14.3 | Friends, if you're planning to buy gold, make sure you don't get ripped off. |
| 0:18.1 | There are a lot of scams out there. |
| 0:19.6 | So, read Peter Schiff's report |
| 0:21.4 | classic gold scams and how to avoid getting ripped off. You can read it for free through |
| 0:27.4 | tomwoods.com slash scams. Welcome back for another week of programs here on the Tom Woods show. |
| 0:34.5 | I believe this episode you're about to hear is the best episode of the show I've ever done. |
| 0:42.9 | Now, that is obviously subjective. You may have your own favorites. I have a lot of favorites. I'm really |
| 0:48.9 | happy with this particular one. And maybe you'll agree. Maybe you won't. We'll find out. |
| 0:53.5 | But what I'm talking about today is a subject that my guest has written on extensively, and it's on the general subject of whether libertarians should support a basic income guarantee to all Americans. Now, you may say, of course libertarians shouldn't support that. It would involve |
| 1:13.1 | state action, and we oppose state action, so therefore it's an open and shut case. But in fairness to |
| 1:19.2 | my guest, Matt Zulinski, he shows that it's not quite so open and shut. I still think it is, |
| 1:24.7 | but he makes probably the best argument that somebody could make for that proposition. |
| 1:30.1 | So we're going to discuss this and more or less debate it here in the episode today, and I'm telling you, you're really, really going to enjoy it because we both love talking about stuff like this, and I think it really comes out here. |
| 1:43.0 | Matt Swelinski is an associate professor of philosophy at the University of San Diego and a co-director |
| 1:49.5 | of the university's Institute for Law and Philosophy. He's also the founder and frequent contributor |
| 1:55.6 | to the Bleeding Heart Libertarians blog, which you can check out at Bleedingheartlibertarians.com. |
| 2:03.6 | He's also a member of the editorial board of Business Ethics Quarterly, and he joins me now. |
| 2:08.7 | So I'm going to turn things over to my conversation with Matt Zwillinsky. |
| 2:13.3 | I hope you like it. |
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